Three days passed.
Three quiet days.
Which, Kael had learned, was usually the worst kind of quiet.
The Bastion evacuation had finished by the second day. Military convoys rolled civilians out of the ruined capital while engineers worked nonstop to stabilize the surrounding districts. Half the city had been lost when the Devourer died, but the rest of the region was still standing.
Barely.
News of the battle spread faster than the Bastion could contain it.
Videos leaked.
Footage of the Devourer rising from the city.
Clips of Kael cutting through the creature in the sky.
A grainy recording of the moment the Devourer's core detonated like a black sun above the ruins.
By the end of the second day the entire planet knew one thing.
A man named Kael Mercer had killed something that used to eat worlds.
Kael hated it.
Mara loved it.
She sat across from him in the Bastion command bunker, scrolling through a tablet while grinning like a kid on Christmas morning.
"Oh this one's my favorite," she said.
Kael didn't look up.
"I swear if that's another meme—"
"It is absolutely another meme."
She turned the screen toward him.
Someone had edited footage of Kael flying toward the Devourer with the caption:
"Local man solves city infrastructure problem."
Kael groaned.
"I regret saving humanity."
Aurelion stood near the far wall of the bunker studying a holographic projection of the sky. The projection showed Earth surrounded by dozens of glowing orbital satellites—remnants of the old global defense networks humanity had rebuilt after the vampire empires collapsed.
Except now the display showed something new.
Something far beyond Earth.
Kael noticed the silence.
He looked up.
"Aurelion?"
The pale man didn't answer right away.
He simply adjusted the projection.
The holographic sky zoomed outward.
Past Earth.
Past the moon.
Farther.
Kael stood up slowly.
"What am I looking at?"
The display zoomed again.
A massive region of space appeared, filled with faint glowing markers.
Each marker pulsed red.
Mara frowned.
"…those aren't satellites."
Aurelion's voice was calm.
"No."
"They are not."
Kael stepped closer.
"How far out are they?"
"Roughly two astronomical units."
Mara blinked.
"Translation?"
Kael answered quietly.
"Past Mars."
The markers flickered again.
More appeared.
Then more.
The room went silent.
Kael counted them.
Thirty.
Forty.
Sixty.
Then the System spoke.
EXTRASOLAR ENTITIES DETECTED
Kael closed his eyes briefly.
"…yep."
Mara turned toward him slowly.
"Don't say that like you already know what they are."
Kael pointed at the projection.
"Devourers."
The word landed in the room like a bomb.
Mara stared at the display.
"…plural."
Aurelion nodded.
"Yes."
The holographic system zoomed in on one of the red markers.
The satellite feed attempted to reconstruct the object using long-range sensor data.
The image appeared slowly.
A massive organism drifting through space.
Bone plates.
Flesh tendrils.
A body nearly the size of a small moon.
Mara whispered,
"…oh."
Another marker expanded.
Then another.
Each image worse than the last.
Some Devourers were smaller.
Others…
Much larger.
Kael felt the Seraph fragment inside him pulse.
Recognizing them.
Remembering them.
"Vale was right," Kael said quietly.
"The bell rang."
Aurelion folded his arms.
"They are accelerating."
Mara pointed at the display.
"How long until they reach Earth?"
Aurelion tapped the projection again.
Numbers appeared beside the approaching markers.
Kael read them.
Then swore.
"Six months."
Mara blinked.
"Six months??"
Kael nodded slowly.
"Six months until the first Devourer hits Earth."
The room fell silent.
Outside the bunker the Bastion soldiers continued working, unaware that something far worse than the Devourer was already on its way.
Mara ran a hand through her hair.
"…so what's the plan?"
Kael stared at the incoming fleet.
He didn't answer.
Because for the first time since killing the Devourer…
He wasn't sure.
The System flickered again.
GLOBAL ASCENDANT NETWORK ACTIVATING
Kael frowned.
"What?"
A new display appeared on the holographic screen.
Points of light ignited across the world map.
North America.
Europe.
Asia.
Africa.
Dozens of them.
Ascendants.
People carrying System seeds just like him.
Mara stared.
"…there's more of you."
Kael nodded slowly.
"Looks like it."
Aurelion studied the map carefully.
"They are waking faster now."
Kael's eyes moved across the glowing points.
Some burned bright.
Others faint.
Each one a potential ally.
Or enemy.
Then one point appeared brighter than the rest.
Far brighter.
Located in the mountains of eastern Asia.
The System zoomed in automatically.
PRIORITY ASCENDANT DETECTED
Kael leaned closer.
"What makes this one special?"
The display opened a data file.
Only a single line appeared.
DESIGNATION: EMPEROR-CLASS ASCENDANT
Mara blinked.
"…that sounds bad."
Before Kael could answer, the bunker lights flickered.
Every screen in the room suddenly went dark.
Then the main holographic projection reactivated on its own.
A single figure appeared in the display.
Someone had hijacked the system.
The image sharpened.
A man stood on a mountain peak surrounded by heavy snowfall.
He was tall.
Broad-shouldered.
Wearing simple black clothing that moved in the wind.
His long white hair flowed behind him like a banner in the storm.
And his eyes…
Glowed silver.
The man looked directly into the camera.
Then he spoke.
His voice echoed through every speaker in the bunker.
"I have been watching."
Kael felt the Seraph fragment inside him react instantly.
Recognizing the power radiating from the figure.
Mara whispered,
"…who the hell is that?"
Aurelion answered quietly.
"…the strongest Ascendant alive."
The man in the projection tilted his head slightly.
His gaze locked directly onto Kael.
Almost as if he could see him through the screen.
Then he smiled faintly.
"So."
"You are the one who woke the war."
Kael stepped closer to the display.
"Who are you?"
The man's silver eyes glowed brighter.
"My name…"
"…is Ryujin."
Snow whipped violently around him on the mountain peak.
"And if the Devourers are coming…"
"…then it is time humanity stops pretending it still owns this world."
The transmission cut.
The bunker lights returned.
Silence filled the room.
Mara looked at Kael slowly.
"…so."
"Six months until cosmic apocalypse."
Kael stared at the empty screen.
"Yeah."
Mara crossed her arms.
"And now the strongest superhuman on the planet just called you out."
Kael exhaled.
"…yeah."
Outside the bunker, the sky darkened as night fell again.
Far beyond the stars…
The Devourer fleet continued its slow descent toward the solar system.
The war that destroyed civilizations across the universe…
Was finally coming to Earth.
And Kael Mercer had just been placed at the center of it.